IN the great Derry-Londonderry debate, BBC Ulster chooses Londonderry. In the great Northern Ireland/Ulster/the Province-the North debate, BBC Northern Ireland’s position is self-evident. In the great the Ardoyne-Ardoyne debate, BBC This Here Pravince favours the definite article. And, of course, the teddy bear’s head continues to float, eerily disconnected, behind the presenters’ heads, a loyal bulwark of the Great British mainland.

It’s a striking fact and a source of pride to some: the number of Irish comics who make it big in Britain. It’s been that way for decades at least: Frank Carson, Dave Allen, Jimmy Cricket, Dermot Morgan, Dara O Brian, Brendan O’Carroll – and, of course that old perennial, Sir Terry Wogan. They’ve all made the British laugh.

The wife of murdered Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane has accused the British Prime minister of publicly humiliating her family after he backtracked on a commitment to hold a public enquiry into her husband’s death.

Money: it would drive you mad if you let it. Can’t live without it, can’t live er um, well actually most of us figure we could live quite nicely thank you with it. Last weekend, Edwina Currie was on Stephen Nolan’s BBC Radio Five Live show expressing her serious, serious doubt that anyone in Britain had so little money, they went hungry.